David Lance Callahan

"[15][non-primary source needed] He has also worked with Swell Maps C21, PJ Harvey, McCarthy, Stereolab, Manyfingers, and Silver Apples as musician, producer or collaborator.

[16][non-primary source needed] Further books are planned on other subjects, including a study of the relationship between British popular musicians and the dole, and a novel expanding on the themes of his song "Foxboy".

[17] He recalls his hometown, at the time, as having been "pretty small-minded, occasionally sinister" with problems of sexism, violence and racism, commenting "if you were deemed to be a – this is in inverted commas – 'a poof'... if you showed any sign of sensitivity or intelligence, you were called that word and often had it hammered home to you with hands and feet.

"[17] One of Callahan’s classmates at primary school was murdered as part of a gangland hit, and he has observed that the area was "the kind of Essex you read about with gangsters moving out there.

[17] Callahan was consoled by Harold Wood's proximity to London and his ability to obtain "obscure and weird and engaging records and books and magazines... Outside my house, it was often a cultural dearth but inside my house, the local library and a few select shops in Romford, there was some colour, intellectual excitement and emotional excitement.

"[17] As a child, he became a keen naturalist, becoming interested in birds and lizards: he had a menagerie at the age of eleven, including newts, a stoat, a bat, a moorhen and a slow worm.

[18] Callahan became an active music fan in September 1977 at the age of twelve, attending concerts by Alternative TV, Patrik Fitzgerald, The Purple Hearts and assorted mod revival and post-punk acts at his local youth club.

[18] Leaving school shortly afterwards, he worked at various dead-end jobs and performed briefly with a few more short-lived local bands (such as The Changelings, which teamed him with Simon Stebbing and Bob Manton from The Purple Hearts plus guitarist Paul Clark).

In 1985, at the age of nineteen, Callahan co-founded a garage rock band, The Wolfhounds (initially with Clark, Andrew Golding, Andy Bolton and Frank Stebbing).

[20] With various line-up changes, The Wolfhounds spent the next few years rapidly developing into an experimental rock band and releasing four albums, Unseen Ripples from a Pebble, Bright and Guilty, Blown Away and Attitude.

[22] After the split of The Wolfhounds, Callahan formed the experimental rock band Moonshake with former Ultra Vivid Scene member Margaret Fiedler.

[24][25] Callahan continued Moonshake with saxophonist Ray Dickaty and various other musicians, continuing to play live (including a three-month tour of North America that included three weeks on the nomadic Lollapalooza Festival with Metallica, The Ramones and Wu Tang Clan, and co-headline tours with Codeine and New Kingdom) and recording two further albums, The Sound Your Eyes Can Follow and Dirty & Divine.

[18][26] Having rediscovered his interest in nature, he began studying Biological Science on a night-school degree course at the University of London's Birkbeck College, as a mature student, as well as spending seven weeks in Madagascar on an ecological survey.

Graduating as a Bachelor of Science, he subsequently went on to gain a master's degree in Taxonomy and Biodiversity at Imperial College (in collaboration with the Natural History Museum and the Zoological Society of London).

[18] The Wolfhounds reformed in 2006 and have gone on to play regularly and to record three new albums, Middle Aged Freaks, Untied Kingdom (...Or How to Come to Terms with Your Culture) and Electric Music.

There are also contributions from other musicians – regular Callahan horns collaborator Terry Edwards; former Pram/Nightingales/Fall drummer Daren Garratt; Alison Cotton (vocal/viola player with The Left Outsides and Eighteenth Day of May); Mel Draisey (violinist and vocalist with The Clientele and Le Volume Courbe); several Spanish students from the Berklee music school in Valencia; and singers Katherine Mountain Whitaker (Evans the Death) and Anja Büchele (Meuve, The $urplu$, Triple Negative).

There's a comedian over here called Stewart Lee, who I know a little bit, and he said to me, 'Your art, basically, is a life sentence'..." Callahan began his solo career with two singles, "She Passes Through the Night" (2018) and "Strange Lovers" (2019).

This is his masterwork, a mélange of what has been called 'mutant Eastern, West African, folk, blues and post-punk influences'... an improbable cross-cultural gumbo, yet one which coalesced into a swirling, kaleidoscopic psychedelia of emotion unlike any other record in this era.

"[43][non-primary source needed] Callahan is a current member of Swell Maps C21 (a project to "rekindle the spirit" of experimental post-punk band Swell Maps, also featuring Jowe Head, John Cockrill, Gina Birch, Luke Haines, Terry Edwards, Lee McFadden, Joss Cope and Chlöe Herington),[44] having played live with the band as well as contributing guitar and vocals to recent studio recordings.